LETTERS TO BUSINESS

Published
4:00 am PDT, Sunday, May 16, 2004

Information security needs to come first

Editor -- The majority of the clients I come into contact with put information security on the back burner. They never hire an information security analyst, nor do they do any sort of audits. This is especially true of companies that outsource information technology functions.

The only time it seems to be important is when they have already been compromised or broken into.

I suppose after enough break-ins ("Window smashed, data lost," Lazarus at Large, May 12) that they become actually aware of, they will tighten up on security and feel it's an important part of keeping data and information safe. By the time I arrive, millions of dollars are already on the line.

Editor -- Economist Tapan Munroe says ChevronTexaco's strong showing on The Chronicle 200 list ("Oil, PCs lead the way for top revenue producers," May 3) "is testimony ... that the long-term romance between the American consumer and the automobile continues."

Baloney. It looks more like evidence of the oil industry's price gouging.

JAN HERNANDEZ

San Anselmo

CPI is not an accurate measure of inflation

Editor -- Kathleen Pender's column "Some tips on TIPS investing" (Net Worth, May 6), on Treasury inflation-protected securities, failed to mention the high risk of tying a 10- or 20-year investment to the accuracy of the Consumer Price Index.

Most households sense that CPI-stated inflation (1.7 percent from March 2003 to March 2004) consistently understates their perceived "basket of goods" inflation when they pay their monthly bills for housing, insurance, medical, energy, utilities, education and food.

What they don't sense is that the index is carefully engineered (some would say fraudulently manipulated) to minimize the calculated inflation. Some of the ways are complex, such as the inclusion of hedonics' (quality improvements) and the proposed changes to move to a change-weighted index.

Some are straightforward, such as ensuring that the wrong items are included in the basket.

For example, about a third of the index is based on housing costs. Although housing costs have soared over the last few years, this increase is not reflected in the index because assumes that all people in the country rent their home, and rental costs have been going down. In fact, more than two- thirds of American households own their home.

Determining the index is complicated and political, but the bottom line is that investors and savers need to be aware of the pitfalls underlying the index and to understand the potentially enormous differences between calculated and real inflation, especially over a 20-year period.

Interestingly, Treasury Secretary John Snow says, "TIPS will lower Treasury borrowing costs," which helps explain why TIPS are being given expanded publicity and availability. If TIPS are good for the Treasury, perhaps the reverse applies to individual investors and savers.

CHRIS KNIEL

Orinda

How to determine crookedest street

Editor -- I loved your article "Rocker, broker, gardener" (May 8).

But you've opened up an interesting dilemma when you raised the implicit question at the end of the piece: What is the crookedest street in San Francisco?

Unfortunately, no one can answer that question without first defining "crooked." Here are some choices:

-- Most number of turns of X degrees or more.

-- Largest average turns per mile for streets of less than Y miles in length.

-- The street with the largest number of turns of Z degrees or more within a span of W miles anywhere along the street.

Of course, you'd have to define "street" as well. Do we count cul-de-sacs that extend into private property or that terminate at the top of a peak?

Choose values for X, Y, Z and W, and you can then select a definition -- and thereby defend the proposition that a given street is the crookedest.

By the way, what street were you thinking of, besides Lombard?

Keep up the good work. We love our city, and we all need more humor these days.

PAUL HOFFMAN

San Carlos

Lazarus preachy in

Quattrone comments

Editor -- David Lazarus' column ("Guilty ... of caring too much," Lazarus at Large, May 4) demonstrates a significant bias, is much too preachy and is way off the mark.

Opinions like his go a long way to influence the "Let's get the rich successful guy (or gal)" that was obvious from reading the quotes from the jurors at both Martha Stewart's and Frank Quattrone's trials, which were omitted from Lazarus' piece.

I find it remarkable that Quattrone and Stewart were thrown to the wolves by the same journalists who sang their praises when everyone was making money. Very hypocritical, and just another example of why The Chronicle's business reporting is held is such low repute by the business community.

Editor -- Give CalPERS credit for this much: It knows how to stick by a bluff when it's been called ("CalPERS unimpressed by Safeway shakeup," May 4).

First, the pension fund succumbed to pressure from its union-influenced board members and attacked Safeway, insisting the company move to make its board more independent. Analysts and others called this move a bold attempt by organized labor to accomplish through its friends on the pension fund board what it failed to do on the picket line or at the bargaining table.

CalPERS insisted its motives were pure. Then, Safeway called CalPERS' bluff, making a number of board changes in keeping with the fund's demands. Amazingly, instead of declaring victory, CalPERS loudly insisted Safeway remained a target for the pension fund.

Clearly, CalPERS has an agenda other than the one it's showing the public.

LINDA OKUN

Glendora, Los Angeles County

Business is booming on S.F. State campus

Editor -- While I enjoyed reading Pia Sarkar's article on job prospects for this year's MBA graduates ("Brighter days for MBAs," May 11), I was surprised it did not include the Bay Area's largest fully accredited business school -- at San Francisco State University.

Similar to the other business schools featured in the story, job prospects look somewhat stronger than in recent years for San Francisco State's graduating MBA class of about 300 students. Students who completed their degrees in January and are in the market have received multiple job offers.

Of course, many of our graduates are not in the job market, either because they are working professionals in responsible positions or because they are returning to positions in another country.

One of the Bay Area's most accessible and diverse business schools, the SFSU College of Business works closely with students to assist them in their job search through career counseling, career fairs, workshops, an alumni network and job listings. JERRY PLATT

Dean, College of Business

San Francisco State University

Disturbing trends

and SBC outsourcing

Editor -- Thanks to David Lazarus ("SBC gets ready for strike," Lazarus at Large, April 25) for the scary heads-up on SBC's disregard for the privacy of its customers.

SBC is probably not the only one engaging in such practices. I don't know anyone who blames India for the outsourcing problem. In fact, most people I know -- particularly ones who have dealt with India in various software and IT capacities -- have a great deal of admiration for the intelligence and business acumen of people there.

If you extrapolate today's situation a couple of generations into the future, the trends are disturbing. The United States is declining in education, with no clear policy in sight (other than to destroy the public school system as we know it) to reverse the trend. Our children are fat and lazy.

Meanwhile, countries like India are working harder to compete in world markets. With all the high-tech jobs in India and all the manufacturing jobs in China, what jobs will American workers have? The only thing left is the service industry, with low-paying jobs held by the least-educated.

Let's hope we see a lot of Indian tourists in the coming years so we can get some of that money back.

ELLIOTT SHANNONHOUSE

San Francisco

Social Security number popular ID

Editor -- I got my Social Security card in 1954. I still have the original document that came with it. It states, "Your card ... is necessary to identify the account as belonging to you, but it has no other purpose. The Social Security card should not be used for identification purposes."

Today that is a big joke. Try to get a bank account without giving them your Social Security number. Try to get a driver's license. Try to get insurance.

STEVE TOBY

Richmond

Vigilance over data should be a reflex

Editor -- How do major corporations justify the level of stupidity that they exhibit by their negligence in safeguarding customers' personal data? ("Window smashed, data lost," Lazarus at Large, May 12). Simple: They are not afraid of the consequences because there are next to no consequences.

Commonsense would tell anyone living in any urban center that you don't leave things in a car unless you want to lose them. The San Francisco Police Department or any other police department can provide the stats on how many cars are broken into daily. It's staggering.

I don't know how to encrypt data in my computers. All I can do in my small office is multilevel password protection. I do have an alarm on the building.

Any offsite emergency copies of discs are not protected from theft (though it's highly unlikely they'd even be noticed). If I had a laptop loaded with my database, I'd never leave it out of my reach. Like a wallet -- how dumb can we be?

ANTHONY VERREOS

San Francisco

It may be a job, but it may not sustain life

Editor -- Tom Abate appears to write two articles -- one under the front-page heading of "National surge in new jobs" (May 8) and continuing, for readers who made it to page 16, announcing a far less promising projection for the U.S. job market.

Missing from much of the current hoopla over an employment recovery is a rather simple question: Just what is a job?

Is it 40-hour-per-week employment at a living family wage, with an adequate medical program and some reasonable benefits, or is it perhaps a temp job or a 19-hour-per-week job at slightly over minimum wage with no benefits?

The number counters make little distinction, nor do they want you to.

In the meantime, the Fortune 500 and thousands of other corporations are quietly exporting many thousands of service-related, white-collar jobs that we thought our advanced educations had guaranteed.